Those who spend some time on the ANS website will find a number of excellent articles pointing out the shortcomings of skeptics of astrology. From misinformation about the essentials of astrology to logical fallacies, the problems with skeptical arguments are clearly and rationally presented.

To no avail, generally speaking. Making a good case for an open-minded approach to astrology is unlikely to do much to persuade those who are, in the words of consciousness researcher Gary Schwartz, “devoutly skeptical.” Describing the shortcomings of skeptics doesn’t change the mind of astrology’s critics so much as bolster the intellectual courage of astrologers.

The intellectual rigidity of skeptics isn’t surprising; despite the fact that astrology’s most vociferous critics are often members of the scientific community. Scientists consider themselves objective and impartial, but it is not scientists but the scientific method that has objectivity. Participating in the scientific method doesn’t wipe out the partialities and prejudices that are endemic to human experience, although it can provide an excellent opportunity to sweep them under the rug and project them onto others (and astrologers make a very convenient screen for those projections).

Unintelligent criticisms can come from intelligent people, and astrological skeptics often display great intelligence when they aren’t talking about astrology. A useful strategy might be to look at the context in which skeptics are operating and the perspective from which they view astrology. Astrologers may actually find some sympathy with skeptics, even in the absence of agreement.

Science’s Greatest Successes

First, we should note that the greatest successes of science have come in the explanation of physical phenomena. In the vast expanses of human knowledge, few things have the objectivity and consistency as, say, Boyle’s Law. A resulting materialistic perspective has become dominant in intellectual culture in the West. While some aspects of astrology might be explained via sunspots and lunar phases, it is a stretch of the imagination to think that the symbolic associations of the planet Venus or the sign of Aries are due to any known physical force. Astrology therefore appears impossible – no further explanation needed – to those who hew to a materialistic perspective.

Wouldn’t we expect that scientists would be eager to apply their method to non-materialistic things? Social scientists do, although with a frequent tendency to reduce psychological and social phenomena to material factors. In general, however, scientists steer away from rather than apply themselves to anything that suggests the supernatural, non-ordinary, or simply nonphysical.

The historical context for this one-sidedness may be found in the history of science. Although science is the dominant intellectual paradigm today, it had a difficult birth process with an extended labor, constricted by the Catholic Church. The trial of Galileo informs the psyche of every modern scientist, and leaves a trace of fear of anything that appears to be irrational. Nor are the threats all in the past – some contemporary high school curricula suggests that the world was created, as is, five thousand years ago. This is a threat not only to evolutionary biology and the entire discipline of geology, but to the scientific method itself.

Scientists and modern intellectuals might be expected to be more discerning, rather than lumping together astrology with religion (religion would certainly appreciate the distinction, as it shares science’s disdain of astrology). But, like religion, astrology is old and it doesn’t meet modern criteria to be considered science, and so the two are grouped together, pragmatically if not precisely.

Lest we forget, the good old days before modern science and the dominance of modern rational thought were hardly idyllic – they weren’t even very good. Our culture may have thrown out the baby with the bathwater in some respects, but that bathwater was very, very dirty with superstition, xenophobia, and prejudice. We have become too oriented to the material side of existence, but we have also made great strides in technology, medicine, law, education, and just about everything, thanks to the rise of science and rationality.

Authority Trumps Evidence

In the old days, authority usually trumped evidence – the earth was literally made in six days because The Bible said so – and disagreement with authority could land a person in very uncomfortable circumstances. Skeptics are fighting against the kind of limited, traditional thinking that hemmed in progress – and freedom – for millennia. In their zealousness to keep antiquated superstition out of modern life, they mistakenly throw out anything that does not meet their standards of materialistic science. Spirituality is discarded along with religious dogma, psychic phenomena are lost along with the notion of spontaneous generation, and astrology is disposed of in the same refuse bin as phrenology. Skeptic’s thinking is erroneous, but their intentions are generally good.

It isn’t solely a matter of concern at the collective level, either. Each successive generation is pulling itself away from limited, prejudicial thinking slowly, one person at a time. People who grew up in very traditional households – religious, cultural, or otherwise – may find themselves in rebellion against the limitations on thought and belief that are imposed by family and community. Anything that appears to be looking backwards is suspect, and astrology certainly looks backwards much of the time. Convincing skeptics that some things they see in their rearview mirrors are worth looking at is difficult, because at heart they so desperately want to move forward.

Can any contemporary astrologer blame them? We have only tenuously reached a point where sexual, economic, and political freedoms are accepted ideals, and we have a long way to go before they are realities. Skeptics are trying to keep us away from the traditional beliefs and rigid thinking that made these things impossibilities for centuries. Astrology is hated because it is seen as traditional (literally, based on tradition), and tradition typically limits freedom of thought and action.

In my discussions with skeptics, I find that they don’t question the mechanics of astrology very much. They don’t think that astrology could work, because there is no good physical explanation for it, but that isn’t their main concern. Rather, they tend to focus on the perceived limitation to freedom that they see astrology implying. They don’t want their life to be fated – they want to have control over their destinies. This is a perspective with which many astrologers could be quite sympathetic. While there are branches of astrology that assume a rather fatalistic perspective, there are also many schools of thought within astrology that posit at least some degree of freedom, and some that assume a great deal of independence is possible.

Those who are working within a materialistic perspective already have plenty of things that will hamper their freedom. Genetics, for example, can be seen from this perspective as determining the length and quality of life, and those who take a sociobiological viewpoint see almost everything as prescribed by the genetic code. Why would they want another set of factors to limit them further? Besides, genetics is theirs while astrology is alien to them.

As an astrologer, I take issue with skeptics. I don’t like that they judge astrology without really knowing about it. Some of the worst of the skeptics have actually forged data to try to prove that astrology doesn’t work. Imagine that! Forging data to protect science! But most skeptics aren’t overtly dishonest, even if they are a bit too one-sided. They aren’t malicious in their intent, even if they are pernicious in their effect. Ironically, they are trying to prevent the very blind ignorance they visit upon astrologers. Yet they do so to keep the world free from some of the ugliest forms of stupidity, and I thank them for that.

“Is it a good thing to go along with the fantasies of childhood, magical as they are? Or should we be fostering a spirit of skepticism? I think it’s rather pernicious to inculcate into a child a view of the world which includes supernaturalism … Even fairy tales, the ones we all love, with wizards or princesses turning into frogs or whatever it was. There’s a very interesting reason why a prince could not turn into a frog –it’s statistically too improbable.”

With these words, Dawkins seems to seek to suck the last fertile juice of creative insight from the fabric of the modern world. Whether fairy stories are true or believed is unimportant, what they symbolize is what counts. Questioning the statistical mechanics needed to transmute a frog into a prince misses the point of the story entirely. Its intention is to train the mind to see possibility and wonder in everything, never to dismiss, to seek promise, to love all creation, the magic that grows from looking for the best in others, beyond obvious first judgments.

Such ways of thinking fuel the originality that is the driving force behind great scientific discoveries. Without it, Darwin is unlikely to have had the courage to undertake studies that led to him turning away from the accepted Creationist beliefs of his time.

By telling fairy stories to our children, we teach them our values and caution them against self-indulgent temptation [Snow White and that gorgeous red, but poisoned apple, Frodo’s struggle against the temptation of the ring, the dangers of following the Pied Piper, that Star Wars ‘force’ that will always be with us!]. More than this, every culture has a rich tradition of myth and legend. It is how the Greeks explored and advised on every aspect of psychology, relationships, emotions and parent/child relationships with images we still use today. Every kind of decision we might make is explored through the travails of Odysseus, his tragic homecoming, Oedipus’ relationship with his parents, the compassion of Prometheus, and, especially suited for Mr Dawkins, Icarus!

Myths, folk rhymes, tales and literature lie at the heart of our culture, its words, music and fine art. They are built into the way we speak and the names we give to things–even planets and other heavenly bodies. Throw out fantasy and you throw out love and intimacy with each other. You throw out originality, the right to challenge reason in the quest to discover a higher reason.

Endangering the growth of original scientific discovery

So, Dawkins’ view of scientific knowledge speaks against the creative tools that inspire, and hence endangers the growth of original scientific discovery. He represents a contemporary in-vogue, conveniently self-indulgent, simplistic view of the nature of knowledge. This sees the Universe as a virgin resource, with a technology for us to manipulate and exploit for our pleasure and ego-satisfaction. Nothing is real until it is discovered and categorized. No consequences need to be allowed for, unless the need to do so has been statistically established. All other ways of looking at the world are ‘unscientific’, even ‘dangerous; harmful for our children to know about’.

While packed with brilliant cleverness, such an approach to knowledge acts as an intellectual strait-jacket that contains our modern world, but empties it of wisdom. For thousands of years, philosophers have taught that the existence of things is dependent upon causes. When causes cease so do the objects, ideas and experiences dependent upon those causes cease to exist. Everything is subject to change and there are rules by which change occurs. Hence, while the modern view of ‘scientific method’ is invaluable in explaining and adapting our experiences, it is limited solely to relative truth. Because reductionist science is incapable of providing absolute answers, it is a dangerous distortion to make it the final arbiter of education.

The intrinsic nature of scientific understanding has changed over the years–not always making linear progress. The Greeks were wiser than the Romans, who were wiser than most of the barbarians that followed. We re-discovered much of the best of both classic cultures and have made great new advances over the last 300 to 500 years. Yet today’s ‘scientific method’ is just not equipped to describe and understand everything. The supposed ‘endgames’ it takes us to (e.g. the 19th century atom, now the 21st century Higgs boson) turn out to be gateways to vast new worlds to investigate.

Wise people looking back on us from the future will wonder why we ignorantly ignored so much of our esoteric and philosophical heritage. They may well turn upside down what scientists today assert as indisputable; just as Darwinists today wonder at the limitations of their 19th century predecessors. Indeed, are not today’s Darwinists the same people-types as Darwin’s 19th-century detractors?

In the history of ideas, Dawkins and his adherents are mere adolescents, drunk with the immature power of the early success of the 17th- to 18th-century Enlightenment. Like tempters at a teenage party, thrown when the parents who know better are away. The pleasures they offer will soon sour into a terrifyingly arid morning after, as we seek to rebuild ourselves, our family, our societies and our very planet from the consequences of ‘pleasures’ we never really wanted at all. A world frighteningly like the one William Butler Yeats went on to prophecy nearly a century ago in the second verse of his The Second Coming:

“…..a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi troubles my sight: a waste of desert sand; a shape with lion body and the head of a man, a gaze blank and pitiless as the sun, is moving its slow thighs, while all about it wind shadows of the indignant desert birds.”

How like Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World, where mechanical science takes all responsibility for procreation. Test tube fetuses are created in five clear categories, suited to their designated social roles from Alpha (governing) to Epsilon (unskilled workers); a world where everyone knows their place. Entertainment is spectacularly commercialized. Sexual experience is entirely recreational and chemically created. Nothing is left to chance in an intrinsically static society.

A neutral space of objective judgment

The tragedy of Dawkins’ position is that most would share his wish to eradicate the delusional fundamentalism that has been behind horrendous slaughter and unhappiness for millennia. Young minds need a neutral space of objective judgment free from such destructive prejudice. Unfortunately, Dawkins’ dogmatic scientism is not such a place. It just moves minds from the frying pan of religious fundamentalism to the fire of linear-reductionist fundamentalism. Intolerant ideas cause actions that isolate and make us suffer. When we stop trying to rub our opponents’ noses in our prejudices, the horrors we think come from their prejudices will lessen. Then we might see what others were getting at all the time and start to lead happier richer lives together. Then, Richard will arise, refreshed with the water of wisdom, and all will be happy to shake his welcoming hand.

This article originally published in the Astrological Journal, September 2014 Vol. 56, No 5.

]]>http://astrologynewsservice.com/opinion/astrologer-rips-famous-skeptics-comments/feed/0Scholar Laments Marginalization of Astrologyhttp://astrologynewsservice.com/opinion/scholar-laments-marginalization-of-astrology/
http://astrologynewsservice.com/opinion/scholar-laments-marginalization-of-astrology/#commentsSun, 24 Mar 2013 01:54:39 +0000http://astrologynewsservice.com/?p=1235It is not a part of the educational systems. It is no longer a component of medicine. It is unrecognized by government. And it is despised by religion. This reality has historical causes that are still being investigated by historians of science, but the present status of the subject is not arguable. Astrology is marginalized at best, and under attack at worst. Given this situation, the people who study and practice astrology deserve a lot of credit for being able to survive in what is really a hostile cultural exile.

The larger problem, as I see it, is that astrology has not yet joined the scientific revolution. The difficulties here lie more in the definition of the subject itself and the language in which it expresses itself. These problems both have origins in the 17th and 18th centuries when other subjects, i.e. astronomy, physics, chemistry, biology, and geology adopted democratic methodologies to test the veracity of their subject material.

The scientific method is a democratic, knowledge-generating process in which nature is studied closely and experiments are conducted in order to discover the rules by which it works. The method was actually applied to astrology in a few instances but these studies were weak because measuring the effects of astrology in units was more or less impossible in the 17th century.
The science of those times was completely reductionist and required units of something to do a proper analysis. Units of temperature, pressure, velocity, distance, etc. are easily applied to most natural phenomena and astronomy, physics and chemistry were well-endowed in that regard. Geology and biology presented more difficult problems but eventually became solid bodies of knowledge through close observation and testable theories. And, very significantly, all of these subjects eventually shed any theological explanations for their interpretations. Without a solid database reducible to units and explanations that were unprovable, astrology fell by the wayside.

A Clear Definition Lacking

A subject can be both a science and an applied art or practice. The lack of a clear definition of astrology as a subject is primarily due to the overwhelming dominance of astrological practice. This is like the field of psychology putting all its focus on just psychotherapy and ignoring research, scientific studies, theory, and its own history. There are close overlaps between applied psychology and applied astrology and it could be argued that natal astrology was the earliest system of psychology. It is true to anyone that bothers to investigate the matter that astrology as a consulting or counseling profession can offer people as much, and in many cases a lot more, than licensed psychotherapists. If psychotherapists really knew what astrology can do, and it wasn’t a taboo subject for them, probably many would learn something about it. And then realize that the subject matter it is a lot more sophisticated, and difficult, than they ever imagined. But not to digress, the point here is that practice is just one facet of the subject of astrology, the study of connections between the larger cosmic environment and the Earth. And practice should be based on scientific research.

Probably the single most important overall problem for astrology is that of a mechanism, that is how does it work? Not everything is explained by a simple mechanism. But in subjects similar to astrology, such as psychology and economics, there is an effort made to distinguish clearly between what is known and what is not known. Hypotheses are proposed and then they are tested; ideologies and beliefs based on opinions or assumptions are not considered explanations. This is the critical-thinking approach that astrology will need to take in order to more fully rehabilitate itself because the very nature of the astrological effect is complex, not easily reduced to units and therefore not applicable to conventional scientific inquiry except in regard to some correlation studies. Unfortunately, anecdotal evidence, which is abundant in astrology, does not carry much weight in the scientific world.

The astrological effect is a phenomenon that probably requires a multidisciplinary approach using system science, the general term for cybernetics, complexity and chaos theories, to unravel its workings. In a sense, astrology has been waiting for scientific methodologies to evolve to a point where they can be applied to the subject. This is also true for other fields, such as meteorology (long-range weather forecasting), biology (what exactly is life), and geoscience (how the Earth remains chemically stable).

Progress is Being Made

Despite the difficulties inherent in these big topics, scientists are methodically chipping away at the problems, in many cases using system science. And they are slowly establishing reliable foundations. Most importantly, these subjects use the common language of science and don’t defer to unprovable metaphysical notions. They are therefore recognized as legitimate subjects by the global cultural institutions of our time. In part because of its intrinsic nature, and in part due to the lack of scientifically-educated students and practitioners, astrology currently uses a highly specialized language and entertains unprovable metaphysical notions that are often taken as truth and not stated simply as hypotheses. This needs to change.

This prescription for the field of astrology (getting with the scientific program and speaking in a language the other fields can understand) is one the astrological community will find controversial- and expensive. Because of its marginalization, astrology gets close to zero funding. In fact, I’d bet that the total amount of funding received by a typical university science laboratory for a month is greater than the total amount of funding put in the hands of research astrologers during the entire 20th century. This is the circular dead end here: no funding equals no progress and no respectability, which in turn equals an inability to attract the brightest minds and funding for worthwhile projects. However, despite these difficulties, astrologers have steadily made progress in rehabilitating their subject and deepening their understanding of it. Astrology has essentially been reinterpreted for modern times without losing its core principles.

So what is to be done regarding the disconnect between astrology and the rest of the world?

Actually, quite a lot has already been done and credit must be given to those who have studied astrology scientifically, excavated its ancient history, and explored its theoretical dimensions – mostly for no pay. In recent years some well-educated astrologers (who we should note had to get advanced degrees in subjects other than astrology) have been interacting with professionals in other fields, mostly history and psychology. There are a few astrology journals today that publish papers on the subject, some of a high caliber and comparable with publications in history and psychology journals. Also, some of the larger astrological organizations and some private schools have created education programs and offer certification. However, most education programs are primarily concerned with how to read a horoscope. And none of the certification programs are particularly difficult by the professional standards of other disciplines that require first a four-year degree and then some serious graduate work. But at least some boundaries are being established and this is a step towards modernization of the field.

To build on this the astrological community would benefit by raising its standards in much the same way the other subjects did centuries ago. This adjustment would include distinctions between professionals and amateurs, unified education and certification standards, and recognition that the scientific method is the best method for democratically generating knowledge. If this were to happen, astrology would be looked at very differently by the rest of the world and may actually begin to once again participate in and contribute to the ongoing evolution of our culture.